Aching Bodies, Hurting Hearts
by BlackBandit111
Summary: Walter probably doesn't appreciate this "Walt Watch" they've set up, but Cabe isn't leaving. His stubbornness opens a few doors to new perspectives, and he offers a bit of comfort he never thought he'd had to. No slash, father/son, post Postcards from the Edge.


_Hello Cyclone! This lovely little fic was suggested by the wonderful XxRoza13, who wanted to see Cabe comforting Walter after one of his nightmares. I do have certain headcanons from my other oneshots incorporated into this fic, but you don't necessarily have to go back and read them if you don't want. If you do, they're called:_

 _Learn,_ _The Boy with Fractured Eyes the Man with Fractured Soul, and Exit Wounds. (There's also some of it in You Got on the Train, Kid, if you like.)_

 _Anyways, I hope you enjoy and thank you XxRoza13 for the suggestion!_

 _Warning: Mentions of throw up, nightmares, crime, and lots of father/son fluffiness._

* * *

Walter's asleep.

Frankly, Cabe doesn't blame him.

It's his first day back from the hospital, and despite the painkillers he's been administered, moving at all hurts terribly. Walter's lips twist whenever he shifts, and Cabe knows firsthand that the walk from the room to the car had been agonizing. (He had leaned upon Toby and Happy the whole way, teeth grit and eyes tightly shut, but no matter how forcefully they insisted he refused a wheelchair.)

(Idiot.)

It's around ten o'clock at night, and he and Walter are alone in the garage. Despite the team hovering like a bunch of mother hens, they do have lives, and Paige has taken Ralph home for the night. Sylvester is, presumably, at home asleep, or else with Meghan, and Toby and Happy left together, so Cabe imagines they're probably doing something romantic.

But he's here, watching over Walter.

(It's probably very telling, especially because he has other things to do- he still has to file a full resignation report and find another way to keep his head above water, but, well.)

He sits and pretends to fill out applications, but truly he's looking past them and not quite paying as much attention as he should be. Sighing as he looks down and only a quarter of the application is completed, he slides it back into the manilla folder and tucks it away, running a hand down his face. He'll have to do it later if he wants to do a semi-reasonable job of it.

He glances up at Walter again, but the kid is still mostly unmoving, breathing even and soft in the near-dark of the loft. Cabe doesn't know why, but there's something uneasy churning in his gut- instinct telling him something isn't right.

His gaze flickers around Walter's room, noting the lack of sentimental items in it, though there is a framed picture of he and Meghan (he's around thirteen, Cabe thinks, all bright eyes and wide smile) and Meghan must be around sixteen or seventeen (paler face than healthy, but pretty as she's ever been, and her dimples are in full blast). There's another small picture across the room of the Scorpions, Ralph in the very center and Cabe at the back, but they all look happy and healthy and safe, and that's all that matters. He remembers when that picture was taken- Paige took it. Walter had only protested slightly.

It makes Cabe chuckle instead of cringe now.

Glancing at the sling and brace that are currently the only things keeping Walter's collarbone together, Cabe wishes that he could rewind time to that moment, when Baghdad and pain and problems were forgotten in lieu of infrequent innocence and foreign fun. (When Walter wasn't...well.)

Cabe looks away.

He gets up and pours himself a glass of water, milling about and not sure what to do. The kid's out like a light (and presumably comfortable) so Cabe settles back into the chair (admittedly much comfier than the hospital's plastic ones) and rubs a hand down his face, leaning his head back. His neck aches.

He doesn't know when or for how long, but drifts to sleep at some point, head tilted back and neck crooked at an even worse awkward angle, and he wouldn't have realized he'd fallen asleep if a whimper hadn't woken him.

At first, he has no idea what it is; it's pitch black in Walter's room without the moon's light, too low set in the sky now to provide any help and for a moment, there's just Cabe and darkness. But then he hears it: the rasp of Walter's breath, once soft and steady, now erratic and panicked. It comes in short bursts of adrenaline, each new wave setting off a surge of hysteria as Walter sucks in huge, gulping gasps of air, his chest heaving and pulling on all his wounds.

Cabe's own breath is stolen.

 _"Thanks to you, I don't sleep. Recurring nightmares-"_

 _"You think you're the only one who has those dreams?"_

Walter exhales a shuddering breath, lips trembling, tears glittering in the nonexistent light as they cling to his eyelashes. Cabe's mouth is dry, and for a moment, he has no idea what to do.

Walter isn't getting enough sleep as it is, and though Cabe always woke his daughter from nightmares, she was ten, not in her twenties. And, for her all her intelligence, she wasn't a genius. He wasn't exactly sure if the same efforts he used with her would be appreciated here.

Decided, Cabe awkwardly shuffles and does his best not to look at Walter's suffering, too sure he'd rush to the young man's aid before he let the nightmare run its course.

But Walter shifts and creases appear around his eyes, and a whimper pulls its way from his throat, barely audible murmurs beginning. "I'm s'rry, I'm...I'm s'rry, no, no..."

Swallowing and running a hand through his hair, he pulls out paperwork as Walter's thrashing gets more violent, his arm restricted by its sling and brace. "'m sorry, I'm sorry- let her go, _let her go_ I didn' _know-_ " he sucks in a sharp breath and his lips quiver, face drawn with terror, making it look fey and innocent in the twilight, and he lets out a gut twisting whine. Wetting his lips and getting to his feet, Cabe creeps forward, heart wrenching in the kind of pain only a parent can feel, hands already extended as if to comfort.

He hesitates.

Walter's face suddenly twists in terror, and in a voice meant for a child and not a man he garbles in a panic, "Leave her alone!" And then, a shriek.

 _"Meghan!"_

And Cabe's heart abruptly falls straight from his chest.

"Walter," he calls as he takes the young man's uninjured arm, pressing down on the brace of the other. It stills Walter's movements slightly, but his panic grows, lips twisting into a desperate snarl. "Walter, open your eyes, kid. Walter- _Walter!"_ It doesn't matter. Wherever the young genius is, he can't hear Cabe.

He thrashes and thrashes and shouts for Meghan and sobs; Cabe has never known him to sob, and it's the most heart wrenching sound he's ever heard. It plucks at his heartstrings like an idle harpist with their instrument.

Cabe isn't sure how long he sits and calls Walter's name, strength the only thing keeping him against the mattress as he fights tooth and nail, names and pleas and threats falling like a shield from his lips.

Walter whimpers-

Then he just gives up.

Cabe sees the precise moment Walter allows the nightmare to consume him. The exact second Walter realizes he isn't going to win, he can't escape, and no one is there to help him is the very moment he simply dissolves into tears. His lips go through the motions caused by incomprehensibly soft, whispered, earnest pleads.

Cabe's heart aches, and wordlessly, thoughtlessly, he pulls the young man gently to his chest.

Walter whimpers again- quietly, softly. His skin trembles where Cabe touches it.

"Son, wake up. Walter? C'mon kid," he says soothingly, and Walter's body shakes. "It's just a bad dream. Wake up. C'mon Walter, s'okay. S'all okay."

"Leave her _'lone_ ," he moans, and Cabe shushes him, brows furrowing further as he watches Walter twist, weakly trying to escape his grasp-

Then Walter's body surges upwards into wakefulness, nearly smashing his forehead against Cabe's as he does so- immediately he's fighting against the blankets, a growl rising in his throat as he claws at the brace holding his collarbone in place-

"Walter, Walter stop," Cabe commands, "it's your brace, it's just your brace son, stop-"

But another sob wrenches its way from his throat and he pitches forward, resting his forehead against the crook of Cabe's neck as he struggles to remove the sling. A desperate whine is starting deep in his throat, and Cabe gently tries to reposition him to help a little, but Walter's arm jerks up and his hand fists in the back of Cabe's shirt, keeping him close.

And Cabe suddenly feels horrible, more horrible than he's ever felt in his entire life- because Walter has never, in all the years the agent has known him, done this. It's beginning to make Cabe terribly uneasy, his gut churning with worry even as he holds the shaking young man close and offers him comfort best he can, best he knows how. "Walter," he says, making sure his voice is as calm as he can make it. "Walter, son, I'm not moving you. I'm trying to help you."

Without his other arm free (because it's clutching at Cabe), Walter is simply tugging his braced arm, risking un-setting his broken collarbone and cause more damage than there already is. Cabe manages to move Walter around and remove the brace, freeing Walter's broken shoulder- and once it's off, the young man just leans against Cabe, face pressed to his collarbone, simply breathing.

Cabe doesn't say anything, just holds onto his boy as he tries to bring himself back from wherever his brain has taken him, and finally Walter seems to become aware enough of his surroundings to pull away, though he doesn't. This, more than anything, troubles Cabe.

"Son?" Cabe says after a few minutes in silence. Walter shifts. "Walter."

Walter suddenly stiffens, his body going completely rigid. When he speaks, it's soft and wounded and raw, and sends chills up the older man's spine. "Cabe?"

"Right here, kid," he's quick to assure. "Right here."

Apparently it's not the right thing to say, because Walter twitches and pulls away, sitting awkwardly beside him. Cabe pretends not to notice the pain creasing Walter's features.

"What was that about?" He asks because he knows Walter needs prompting. When there's no answer, his voice hardens. "Walter. Tell me."

But Cabe already has an idea, and there's a sickening feeling starting deep in his gut.

 _"Thanks to you, I don't sleep. Recurring nightmares-"_

" _You think you're the only one who has those dreams?"_

Because though Cabe's dreams were terrible, he can say with complete honesty they were never like _that_. He never had to _resign himself_ to terror. Not like what just happened.

"Nothing," Walter says, and even in the dark Cabe sees how Walter avoids his eyes.

"Walter."

"Let it go."

There's something- something, something in his tone that Cabe has never heard before. It's soft. It's vulnerable.

It's not like he's never heard Walter afraid. Or perhaps he just thought he did, and even then Walter was wearing a mask. Either way, Cabe shifts his position on the bed, sits up straighter.

"You know I can't do that, son."

Walter _wilts_. He just lists over and rests his forehead against his own shoulder and breathes ragged breaths. Cabe is silent, unwilling to push yet unwilling to let him let it go and retreat.

So they sit in silence.

After innumerable minutes pass like this, however, Cabe sighs. "Okay O'Brien. Start with facts."

This catches Walter's attention, and though Cabe can't see him, he can hear the young man swallow.

He's trying to say words that won't come.

"Take your time, kid. I don't have anywhere t'be."

So they sit in further silence, but Walter's effort is clear as he tries to force forward words that refuse to be emitted, even in the cover of the dark. Cabe is nothing if not patient- years of dealing with the young genius come to his aid and provide him with more patience than he'd ever needed.

"I..." Walter pauses. Runs a still trembling hand through his curls. It must be unnerving for him, Cabe thinks, to not be able to control that. "I told you already. Recurring night...nightmares. You said that I wasn't- wasn't the only one who had those dreams."

And Cabe's heart nearly shatters.

That...that hadn't- that hadn't been what he'd meant.

That hadn't been what he'd _meant_.

"I-" he chokes on the words, a clog of the worst kind in his throat. "I didn't mean it like that, Walter."

Sharp. "Then what did you mean it like?!"

Walter has every right to be angry, but Cabe refuses to be spoken to that way, genius or no. "Listen here, Walter O'Brien," he warns. "You've got every right to be angry, but talking like that and working us both up isn't going to help any, so tone down and just communicate for once without-" he was about to say "the added drama", but Walter doesn't really mean to add that, and Cabe, for all his vexation, doesn't want it to become a barb. "...without the situation escalating more than it already has."

Walter swallows audibly again, and Cabe's eyes, now accustomed, see Walter smooth down the hair at the back of his head on a whim, hand brushing over the locks at his neck. It's something Meghan did often when they were children to calm Walter down, and seeing it now makes something in Cabe ache in a way he can't describe. "Okay."

The agent takes a deep breath. "Okay," he says.

Walter says nothing. Cabe says nothing.

"That happened a lot," he finally says quietly.

Cabe knows the game. He plays it well. "What?"

"The..." Walter shifts awkwardly. "Nightmares."

And despite itself, Cabe's heart softens. "When did they start?"

Walter goes frosty. "When It happened."

Cabe can almost _hear_ the capitalization.

"Toby..." Walter hesitates. "Toby helped. When I met him." He rubs absently at his collarbone, and Cabe wishes he could get up to get Walter's pain meds, but he knows that'd send him back into his shell more than anything. "He was-" a small, humorless breath of a laugh- "he was pretty terrible at it. At- at first. Waking- waking me up, I mean."

Silence as Cabe thinks of what to say. "What happened?"

Walter gulps, brushes his hair down again. "Threw up," he murmurs. "Quite a bit. At le- least until he figured out not to shake me."

Cabe's blood runs cold.

Now that Walter's started, he can't seem to stop. "And- it went on for a while. Every night, Toby woke me from the dr- the nightmares. I learned to pause my dreams and rewind them so I could remind myself I had dreams still. Good ones." He stops. Starts. "They weren't often, but they were there."

Cabe almost hates to ask. "And...what were they about?"

Walter doesn't say anything- Cabe can almost see the flash of fear that presents itself in Walter's eyes, hidden from the world. But it's gone, and when he speaks his voice is forcibly calm. "Cabe, drop it." There's an unspoken _please_ in the words, one that Cabe finds hard to ignore.

 _"Thanks to you, I don't sleep. Recurring nightmares-"_

" _You think you're the only one who has those dreams?"_

When he speaks, it's genuine. "I'm sorry, son."

And, just like in his nightmare, Walter gives up.

He stiffens- seems to prepare himself as if Cabe is going to hit him, because he hunches in on himself and ducks his head. One hand is pressing against his collarbone, the other holding the side with the broken ribs, and when he speaks, his voice quivers much like it had when he was trapped in his dreams. "Th-they just always m-manage to get her."

"Who?" Cabe asks, though he already knows the answer. Walter loves his sister above anything- even his IQ. He'd give it all- everything he was- up in a second if there was even a possibility he thought it would help her.

"They just...I can't get to her in time. They're going to get her and I can't get to her in time, and they're all so angry, and they- they just take her and- and-" Cabe is suddenly hit with the sickening thought that of all the things they've faced, Walter is most afraid of the petty criminals- the robbers, the rapists- the people that he can't stop because they're _everywhere_. Because Meghan can't get away from them on her own. Walter is constantly worried about her (and Cabe knows that he calls his sister at least once everyday), so this fear, when he's asleep, must be multiplied tenfold.

Cabe dreams about Walter being murdered by the injured and grief stricken people of Baghdad.

And to Meghan, Walter dreams they do worse.

"Oh, son," he utters because he doesn't know what else to do. "Oh, Walter."

They sit in silence. The beating of two hurting hearts thumping in their ears.

The darkness lifts a little and gives way to the strange non-blackness just before dawn.

At some point, Walter has to shake himself awake, and in the process grunts in pain. Cabe wordlessly rises and hands Walter his pain medication, then helps him back into the sling. The brace, which Walter hasn't parted with because it relieves some of the pain, remains off. Walter doesn't even glance at it.

More time passes.

Walter falls asleep just as the sun peeks through the slats of the blinds, head tilted to one side, one hand loosely brushing against the curls at the base of his neck, arm resting beside his head. The other gently clutches at the blanket, much in the same way it clutched at Cabe's shirt.

And Cabe stays, sits in vigil, watches Walter's chest rise and fall, keeps the nightmares at bay. Quiet coaxing will draw Walter out of the starts of one, and soft calling will wake him enough so the same one doesn't occur again.

By the time eight thirty rolls around, Cabe is hungry and Walter is finally resting in peace, so he heads downstairs to the sparse kitchen the garage has in search of something edible.

Toby sits at his desk, playing a bit of solitaire, but he looks up when Cabe comes down. "Hey," he says and swings his feet down from where they're propped up. "How is he?"

No preamble, no wit. Just _how is he?  
_  
"Fine," he says sincerely, and Toby narrows his eyes- not looking for a lie. Asking without words. "There was a bit of trouble earlier," Cabe admits as he pours himself a glass of water and pulls out a tangerine. "But it was taken care of."

Toby sags in what Cabe assumes is relief. "That's good to hear," he says and his eyes dart to the loft, and Cabe is almost amazed he hadn't seen it before, in the way they move. "Guy needs a break."

"He said some stuff," Cabe suddenly admits, and Toby turns back to him. "Things that he said you helped him with."

Toby swallows, and it strikes Cabe that Toby is _young_. Younger than Cabe thinks he is most times. He's only in his early thirties- not much older than Walter. The fact that Toby was responsible for Walter at all makes Cabe's insides twist.

"Yeah," Toby agrees, and it strikes Cabe because it's wary. "I do."

 _Do_. Not _did_.

Too knowing.

He doesn't know what to say.

He doesn't think anything can be said.

And later, after Walter wakes and the first thing he does is tell them he's taking a drive, Cabe doesn't say anything then, either.

* * *

 _Alright, how was that? Did we like it? How was the characterization, the nightmare, Toby, even? Good, no good? Thank you for reading, I hope you enjoyed, and please leave me a comment on your thoughts!_


End file.
